As German troops withdrew from Finland following the Finnish armistice with the Soviet Union, they engaged in an orgy of destruction. Having burned the town of Rovaniemi, the SS Norwegian Ski Battalion attempted to keep open the 6th SS Mountain Division's retreat route. Along the way they ran into Finnish troops eager to avenge the war crime committed by their "brothers in arms." Like most German allies, Finland's army emerged from four years of cooperation with a deep desire to fight the Germans.

Conclusion

Both side fought with great determination, and suffered heavy casualties. The Norwegians were forced off the road, but continued their withdrawal along other routes. More 11th Division forces were hurrying to cut the SS into the small pockets known as "motti," where they could be more easily eliminated. The division would have to fight its way out of Finland.

We decided the first scenario went quick enough to go ahead and play a second very small scenario. This one looked pretty quick, so on the table it went. A small force of Finns with better morale, a mortar unit in support, and weak OBA are looking for vengeance on a smaller Norwegian force with slightly better OBA trying to hold a road open for SS units to escape. The Norwegians need to keep the road clear and exit two retreating SS GEB units, while the Finns need to occupy the road, prevent GEBs from exiting (2 for minor victory, 0 for major), and kill Norwegians (4 steps for minor, 6 for major).

The Norwegians set up in the eastern woods, and the Finns advance to the eastern edge of the woods. As the Finns begin penetrating the forest, the Norwegians pull across the road to the western woods. Eventually both sides are looking at each other from across the road. A pair of GEBs enter, and the Finns decide if they try to move down the road then opfire will mess them up. Instead the GEBs decide to move west and go completely around the forest. The Finns decide they will catch them on the southern end of the road near endgame and rush across the road to try and close with the Norwegians.

The Norwegian player decides to play for the draw, yielding the road while trying to draw the Finns into the forest for an extended chase. If they can prevent closure, the Finns will not kill enough Norwegians to win. Half the Finns are chasing two Norwegian units in the north, with the rest chasing the four in the south. Norwegian OBA is effective at shaking up some Finns in the north, forcing a fallback before the chase can begin again, but Finnish arty forces some disruptions on the southern Norwegians, allowing closure.

In the north, the remaining GEBs come on just before the Finns can squeeze the Norwegians, and these reinforcements are enough to spoil the Finnish plans. In fact, on turn 10 the first step loss is scored, as the German/Norwegian force, backed by OBA, inflicts a step on a Finn Inf unit, and the northern attack ends up going nowhere.

In the south, the Finns allow the GEBs to move off, using the Inf stack that was going to block them to close the door on the Norwegian force. The Finns used the HMGs to close from the east with adjacent Inf approaching from the NE, while the blocking Inf force speeds around the slow moving Norwegians to approach from the south, and the Norwegians are somewhat trapped. Three assaults on the 24 column all result in rolls of ‘1’ (my normal roll on the 24 column), shaking the Norwegians but leaving them at full strength after ten turns. The assault also disrupts some Finns, dropping the assault column to 18 for turn 11. I roll a ‘5’, and the Norwegians suffer their first step loss, and the morale of the Norwegian units plummets. On turn 12 the Finns again assault on the 18 column, I roll a ‘4’, and the Norwegians suffer a step loss, plus a second one from a compound demoralization. The southern blocking force, which is now adjacent to the stack of disrupted Norwegians not in the assault hex, goes all out and assaults the Norwegians on the 13 column. I roll a ‘5’, inflicting one step loss for the win on the very last roll of the scenario!

This scenario is nearly impossible for the Norwegian player to win, but with successful maneuver there is a good chance of pulling the draw if the player decides that strategy up front. It was a much more tense and interesting scenario than I expected, as I normally do not like very small scenarios. I rated this a 3 despite the near impossibility of a Norwegian victory simply because both players really enjoyed the cat and mouse game play.